Laurie Penny writes, "What do you give your single friends and ex-partners on Valentine's day?
Cult online journal The New Inquiry has released a product line to help them keep on paying their writers and staff. Their exclusive misandrist totebag, with a design by Imp Kerr, is aimed at all those who want to smash the romantic industrial complex in style."

$8 gets you six of SScotty 2 Naughty's Valentines cards themed for Toronto's crack-smoking, drunk-driving, thug-beatdown-commissioning lout of a mayor, Rob Ford. They sport slogans like "I must have been in one of my drunken stupors when I fell for you" and "I refuse to resign my love for you." Genius! And romantic.

The wonderful, edible weirdos at the Eat Your Heart Out blog are throwing an anatomical heart pop-up shop for Valentine's day in east London, at the site of this month's edible horror installation on Bethnal Green Road:

Very excited to share more information about the anatomical heart pop up in London for Valentine’s Day. Indicative of the way Eat Your Heart out has become a cultural leader, the shop is 60% gifts and art 40% cakes and chocolate treats. It’s being run under the guise of Anatomical Snuff Box, a venture from myself and Emily Evans promoting the education of anatomy using cultural channels. You can see all of the gifts here (more being added daily). The wonderful Kraken Rum are also supporting the event so expect lots of free rum shots and rum soaked cakes – if you have not tried this amazing drink yet here is your chance.

Buzzblog sez, "Ten years ago today, at 9:25 a.m., Slashdot founder Rob 'CmdrTaco' Malda, used his insider access to the homepage of one of the tech world’s most popular forums to send a very public Valentine’s Day marriage proposal to Kathleen Fent. Fifteen minutes later she said yes -- and then called him a dork -- an exchange that would generate more than 2,000 comments and make news on other tech sites. As the 10th anniversary of the proposal approached, Network World asked the couple to share their memories of that day and thoughts about it since, as a kind of case study on how this type of public proposal – be it on Slashdot or the stadium Jumbotron – holds up over the years. Would they recommend it? … Seems there is disagreement on that score."

Kathleen, what was your reaction the moment you read your name in that headline and realized what was happening?

I knew something was afoot when I left for work and Rob said "See you soon!" I decided to check Slashdot right away when I got to work to see what was going on. When I saw my name in the proposal, I slammed my hand down on the desk and screamed, "Oh my god!" before I could even read the entire article. I started to hyperventilate.

Everyone rushed back to my cubicle to see what was the matter. I had to resist the urge to phone Rob at home, knowing that an email reply was much more fitting for the eventual story we'd tell.

Further to Mark's bizarre old Valentines post from yesterday: Flickr user Page of Bats has assembled a marvellous and often inexplicable collection of tasteless, gross and weird vintage V-day cards. I can't figure out of some of these were from the likes of MAD magazine, or if they were all created in earnest by clueless card companies.